


Oceans You Have Seen

by cold_feets



Category: Vikings (TV)
Genre: Ficlet Collection, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-04-09
Updated: 2013-04-12
Packaged: 2017-12-07 23:21:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/754290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cold_feets/pseuds/cold_feets
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Collection of ficlets written for a prompt meme.</p><p><b>4.12.13</b> - Chapter 3: Ragnar + Athelstan - healing</p><p> </p><p>  <i>Ragnar is a man whose desire to move took him across an ocean that might have ended only in his death. Confined to a bed, he is miserable and does his best to make everyone else in Floki’s hut suffer with him.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Pre-Athelstan/Lagertha/Ragnar - clothing

Not long after he had arrived at Ragnar's household, a pair of trousers had appeared on his bed.  He had been hesitant about abandoning his habit after already having so many of the things he cared for and understood ripped away. But as he spent more time helping on the farm, spending long days in the summer sun, he allowed himself to be swayed by practicality.

Now, as summer wanes, it becomes clear that he'll need more than just the thin shirt to get through the coming months.  He worries about mentioning it to Ragnar, despite the relative friendliness that has met most of his requests so far. He is still a slave, after all, until Ragnar tells him otherwise. And while knowledge is free, clothes are not, and perhaps asking for them crosses a line.

In the end, Lagertha saves him the trouble.

She calls him inside as he and Bjorn are finishing with the animals for the evening, and he ignores Bjorn's insistence that he must have done something wrong and now will pay the price.

"Try this on," Lagertha says, throwing an old tunic at him. "It's old, but still good. And you won't last much longer in only what you have."

The tunic is big.  It clearly must have been Ragnar's at some point.  The shoulders hang off his slighter frame, but Lagertha cinches a belt around him and adjusts and smooths until she is satisfied, all with the practiced efficiency of a mother with two children rapidly growing out of their clothes with each passing season.

"Good?" she asks him, still fixing the collar.

He nods.

"There's a cloak as well. It's worn but still warm. And--"

She turns back to the chest she pulled the tunic from and shoves a pair of boots into his chest.  "Try these."

They're also too big.  He doesn't say, but she's there again, touching, pressing, checking.  She frowns and looks up at him.  "They'll do for now. Next time we are in Kattegat we will find something better.  You'll need something proper before winter."

"Thank you. Truly, this is--"

She stands, tries to smooth a stubborn wrinkle from the tunic again.  "We would not let you freeze," she promises.

Ragnar smiles when he sees him and ruffles his hair where Athelstan's finally let it grow in.  "You don't look like our priest anymore."

Athelstan ducks away and tries to hide the rush of disappointment that fills him by smoothing down his hair.  The life he left gets further away each passing day, and he can't help thinking he should miss it more.  He thinks that he shouldn't like that he is _their priest_ because Ragnar and Lagertha are tangible and _there_ in a way that his God has not been for some time now, and he'd rather that than be on his own.

He thinks it shouldn't be a comfort when Lagertha hooks her chin over Ragnar's shoulder, smiles at Athelstan, and says, "He may not look it, but he still is."


	2. Ragnar/Lagertha - proposal

What Ragnar does not tell Bjorn is that after the bear and the hound, there was Lagertha herself, shield ready, sword in hand, fiercer than either of the beasts he had killed.

“My love, you do not need to prove yourself to me.”

Lagertha narrowed her eyes at him. “I have saved your life in battle, slain more men than you can count. It is you who needs to prove yourself to me.”

He gestured with his sword. “Is the bear not enough proof?”

In answer, she brought her sword down upon his shield, and he could hear the wood begin to splinter under the force of it.

He grinned and lunged at her, but she blocked him, his blow glancing wide off her shield. She turned into him and brought the hilt of her sword hard into his stomach. He stumbled back a few steps, barely recovering in time to bring up his shield against her next blow. He shoved her off and swung out, his sword connecting with the edge of her shield and knocking it free from her grip.

He raised his eyebrows at her, prepared to let her concede the fight here, but she only came at him again. He dodged, grabbed her around the waist, and threw them both to the ground. She landed with a grunt and tried to roll away, but he pressed her arms into the dirt, shield and sword abandoned.

“What is your answer, then, shieldmaiden?”

She glared up at him for a moment, but then her gaze softened, a smile spreading across her lips. He ducked down and kissesd her, and when she leaned up into it he abandoned his grip on her arms, slipping one hand into her hair. Her mouth was warm, her body soft, and the edge of her knife was suddenly pressed to his throat.

He stilled. Her lips, still pressed to his, split into a wide grin. Retreating from the edge of the blade, he eased back off of her, hands held up in surrender.

“You have a weakness, Ragnar Lothbrok,” she said.

“In you?” He shrugged. “Always.”

She shook her head, trying to hide her smile. He held his hand to his heart and did his best to look wounded, which finally made her laugh, a bright burst of sound that made her nose wrinkle and her shoulders shake, and the knife fell away. She slid her leg over his, settling in his lap, and tugged at his hair to tilt his face up to hers.

“All right,” she said, dropping a kiss to his lips. “I accept.”


	3. Athelstan + Ragnar - healing

Ragnar loathes being wounded like nothing else, a fact which does not surprise Athelstan in the slightest. Ragnar is a man whose desire to move took him across an ocean that might have ended only in his death. Confined to a bed, he is miserable and does his best to make everyone else in Floki’s hut suffer with him.

“You’re like a child,” Lagertha tells him, as she tries to help a reluctant Ragnar up to sitting so she can tend his wounds.

“And you are always prodding! You tell me to rest, so I rest, but then you wake me to put more of this foul smelling mash on me.”

She grabs his chin, forces him to look her in the eye. “I am trying to see you well. If only so that you will finally heal enough to get out of this house and give us all some peace.”

He bats her hand away, scowling. “I would never return,” he tells her.

“I’ll pray for it,” she snaps back, swatting at his head.

They’ve been like this for days now, all of them losing their temper with each other in turn. Athelstan’s been surprised to find that Floki is a calming presence given all his oddities and twitchiness. However, there is only so much he can do as the winter storms and Earl Haraldson’s men keep them stuffed seemingly shoulder to shoulder in Floki’s few rooms.

Lagertha gets to her feet and shoves the bowl with Floki’s herb mixture into Athelstan’s hands. “Clean the wounds. Put this on. Cover them with fresh bandages.”

“Where are you going?”

“Away from him,” she says, grabbing her cloak and disappearing out the door.

Athelstan stares after Lagertha as she leaves, wondering how she expects him to get Ragnar to obey where she could not.

On the bed, Ragnar slumps back against the wall, one hand rubbing wearily at his face. After a moment, he lets out a defeated sigh and beckons Athelstan over. “Be quick, then.”

Ragnar allows Athelstan to ease him up and help him pull the loose shirt off over his head. He sits relatively still as Athelstan unwinds the bandage from his middle so he can get to the wound on his side. Underneath,the skin is red and still oozing slightly, though less than it was last week. Athelstan cleans it carefully with a wet rag.

“How does it look?” Ragnar asks, trying to twist enough to see it.

Athelstan stops him with a firm hand on his shoulder. “If you move like that, you’ll break the skin again. It’s healing, but slowly.”

“Slowly, always slowly,” Ragnar mutters, turning to face forward again.

“I think we all wish by now that you would heal faster. But this is the only way.”

“ _This is the only way_ ,” Ragnar repeats in a voice that is apparently meant to be a mockery of Athelstan’s.

Athelstan can’t stop the chuckle that escapes him as he picks up the bowl again.

“What’s funny?” Ragnar snaps.

“Lagertha’s right. You are a child.”

Ragnar reaches behind him and tries to push Athelstan away. “Leave the herbs. I can do this myself.”

Athelstan pushes him forward again, all gentleness gone, hoping it will shock Ragnar into compliance. “You can’t even piss on your own. So sit still and let me finish, and then maybe I’ll help you to the door for some air.”

Ragnar stills and turns his head just enough to watch Athelstan out of the corner of his eye. “I thought I was meant to be resting.”

“So when Lagertha returns we shall have to tell her you were resting,” Athelstan says, finishing with the herbs and reaching for the clean bandages. “Agreed?”

Ragnar offers only a grunt in response, but he doesn’t move again, not once.


End file.
